Blueprinting the Shot: A Parent's Guide with Joel Turner

Transcript:

Blueprinting the Shot: A Parent's Guide with Joel Turner

Manisha: Hello Archery Family. It's Manisha of the Archery Parent Podcast. Today's guest has fundamentally changed how Archers think about the shot process. He's coached SWAT teams and pro athletes.

Joel, welcome to the podcast. I am so happy that you are finally here. We've been trying to do this for a while.

Welcome to the podcast.

Joel: Yeah, thanks for having me.

Manisha: Joel is one of us. He is an Archery parent. He is a Barebow Archer, and he is sometimes on the line, sometimes he's off the line. But number one, he is an Archery Dad who has experienced the highs and lows with his Archer.

And we're going to talk a little bit about that before we get into your program of SHOTIQ,  Joel, tell us, who is your Archer?

Joel: My Archer, I guess, is my son, Bodie Turner. And he is phenomenal. He is been a professional Archer since the age of 15. He started shooting a bow at 10 and a half months old. He couldn't even stand up.

He used to lean up against the couch, he'd draw his little bow back and then he'd fall over on his bum and shoot his arrow. But by about 18 months he was out there shooting a long bow, and it's just been nonstop from there.

Manisha: You were an Archer before he was born? How did he get into Archery?

Joel: I have been an Archer since I was seven years old, so that was 43 years ago. And Archery's been my life. I've been fascinated with the flight of the arrow since I was seven and at two weeks old, I think, I put Bodie in the front pack shooting a bow at, I think, he was only two weeks old, so he would be in a front pack.

All of his early toys were bows and arrows, and we'd have an arrow with a big rubber blunt on the end that he used to sit in my backpack and whack me in the head with it while I was shooting my bow. It's just been the focal point of our lives since he started and since I was seven.

It's been quite a journey.

Manisha: For a lot of parents. They may have seen Bodie on stages on some of the biggest stages. Mm-hmm. Holding significant cheques for prize payouts. Let's go back to those early days for a moment.

Let's talk about you and Sarah as a family, as the Turner family of Archers. Take me back to a special moment that has nothing to do with a win.

Joel: Oh, wow. There, I mean, Bodie started competition shooting at about nine years old and, but like I said, he started shooting at 10 and a half months and there was, we have a video of Bodie at two and a half years old, shooting balloons outta the air with his suction cup arrows in the kitchen, and, and he is just yelling again, again, again.

You know, so it was, I built, I, I shouldn't say I “built” Bodie, but I built Bodie's mind from a very young age. And I basically got him hooked into the flight of the arrow and watching the flight of the arrow and just becoming fascinated with it. I mean, that moment in the kitchen was, you know, mama's filming and I'm throwing balloons in the air and Bodie's shooting him out of the air.

And, and that just progressed and it was every day. We shot every day. And, and I never pushed him into anything. And that was, I think, one of the key points of it. I just, I knew what hooked me into Archery at the age of seven, and I just used those tactics. My dad didn't shoot a bow. I just picked up a bow.

At seven years old, my dad had this old Bear Recurve in the corner of the garage, and I just started picking up. I could barely pull the thing, but as soon as I shot an arrow out of that thing, it was just. It was mystical. And so we just did those things with Bodie and it was every day.

So there's so many moments of, of Bodie growing up and we have videos of it and it's really cool to see.

Manisha: When you get the chance to actually watch Bodie at a tournament, are you the type of parent that is super calm as you're sitting in the seats? Or, are you the type of parent who needs to pace? Do you stand up? Are your palms sweating? What kind of parent are you when you're watching Bodie in? Not a shoot off, because that's totally different, but just competing for the qualification round, say.

Joel: I mean, I get a little bit nervous because the game that he plays one miss and you're done. You know, I mean, if you miss a 10-ring, you're done. And if you're in a shoot-off, you miss an X-ring, you're done. So Bodie's level is so high. I watch. Not only the target. I watch him and I can see by his shot timing exactly what's going on in his mind.

And he's so good at being aware of what he needs to do mentally in these shots. It's just like watching a masterpiece, I guess. Yeah, of course I get nervous, but. He's won so many big tournaments. I mean, he's literally won every, in the US, just about every big tournament there is. There's a couple that he hasn't got yet, but, and we're just now starting into the ASA circuit, but he's been there and done that.

So I, I read his target and I read his body so that I can read his mind.

Manisha: With all the success at any point in Bodie's careers thus far, how do you as a dad deal with what an Archer could consider as a bad day? Do you go into coach mode or do you go buy ice cream and just not talk about it, talk about something else, and then visit it later?

Joel: Yeah, we don't talk about that. I mean, Bodie doesn't have a coach. I'm not Bodie's coach. Most of the professional Archers don't have coaches, and I hope that we get into talking about that.

We know what happened. I mean, if he misses, it's not because of a bad shot. It may be an equipment issue, which, you know, we can both deal with. I don't have to worry about Bodie's mind, and that's where I differ from most parents because most parents are having to deal with their child's mind and how it is being applied to Archery.

And it's tough. It is very difficult for young people. We're literally asking them to do something

that's just shy of impossible. And we expect young minds to be able to override their own central nervous system. And that's something that I didn't, I never had to worry about with Bodie because we built this system of shot control from day one.

I bought him his first Compound when he was three years old, and at three I bought him a little index finger trigger. And his little 3-year-old mind, of course, punch the trigger. And that's where most parents, they buy their kids whatever the equipment they can afford, and then they buy them a release aid and they punch the trigger. Maybe it's not the first shot, but it's the second one.

You only get one chance in life at a perfect shot. A perfectly shot arrow that has no recoil bracing attached to it. No pre-ignition movements. You only get one chance. The second one is where the pre-ignition movements are already formulated in the brain, the second shot ever.

And so as soon as I saw Bodie do that, I'm like, we're not going down that path. I'll share with you the ways that we were able to formulate his mind and how I formulate the minds of thousands of young people in Archery, because there is a very specific path to follow. That most parents are not following and they're dealing with the frustration of it.

Manisha: That is exactly where we are going to head because a lot of parents do take on this frustration for a sport, unlike you, a lot of parents who have no reference to what it is like to shoot, to be in a precision sport, and to have the pressure around them.

And then they feel like they can talk their Archer through something that they actually have no idea. And actually, I'm just going to say this, and we will move into it. A lot of coaches who do not compete, also feel like they have a spot to talk about any of this pressure, which I totally don't understand.

And I say this because I know a few of them.

Joel: Mm-hmm.

Manisha: And yet here they are thinking that they can talk about the mental side of Archery.

Joel: Many parents try to coach their children, but what we have to understand is biologically that is backwards. Children learn basic life skills from their parents, and the parents are trying to set examples for them.

But two problems. The one problem is children are biologically wired to get information from their uncle or aunt that lives three ridges away. That's how human beings are supposed to get information because they're supposed to spread their genes. They're not supposed to stay in this little family unit and get all the information from the parents, and then they go out in life.

They're supposed to go out get information from other people. That's what we call it, the 50-mile rule. You cannot be an expert unless you live at least 50 miles away. Parents, please understand that your children are not biologically wired to take information from you, and it's very frustrating because that's all we do.

That's all we can do is set these examples. But if we are teaching a child work ethic or any skill, the problem is we don't know how we do it as parents, so we can't possibly teach it. Like, we can probably agree that younger generations don't have as good of a work ethic as we may have. That's kind of a general consensus, but what's the problem?

Shame on us because we never taught our kids work ethic. The only way we thought we could teach it was through example. You may have a phenomenal work ethic, but you can't teach it because you don't know how you got it because your grandpa or grandma set an example for you and you took that upon yourself.

But how to teach it is you have to convey to your children how you did it. How you did it involves what you said. We all listen to these stories of an older person and they'll be telling you a story of maybe a stressful event that they were in. And there's nuggets in there that you have catch. And the nugget that you have to catch is when they say this specific phrase:

"Then I remember saying...", because that's the nugget.

If you have that, they'll tell you all about the stressful situation and how they got themselves through it is through what they said. “And then I remember saying: just keep going”, or whatever that may be. The skill is not in them getting through the stressful event.

The skill is in what they said so that they could get through the stressful event. Right? So work ethic. When you and I look at a task, we don't like to do it, right? So we're going to look at that task and go, "Oh man, this is going to suck, but I'm going to do it anyways".

That phrase: "...but I'm going to do it anyways", or whatever you say to actually start the task is the skill of work ethic. But younger generations look at it and go, "Hmm, that's going to suck", and that's where their conversation ends because we never taught them. When we are faced with a task.

We never taught them what we say to get the task started. That is where the skill lies. That is just some stuff that, that we deal with at MINDIQ and SHOTIQ, but we don't know how we do what we do. And when that happens, like you're saying, a parent that's never stood on that yellow line in an indoor tournament and had the stress of perfection, they don't know how they do it because they've never done it.

And even if they have done it, if the coaches have done it, they don't know how they did it, so they can't possibly teach it. That's the difference between Bodie and I and most people, is we know exactly how we did it because we know what we say and when we say it, to direct our conscious mind into specific places at specific times.

I don't consider myself an Archery coach. I consider myself a speech coach because I literally teach people how to talk in high stress events.

Manisha: So you said that a lot of Pro Archers do not have coaches. Can you tell me more about that?

Joel: Because there really aren't any coaches that have been at their level because if, if an Archer's been at that level and then they become a coach, they don't know how they did it. So they teach the same things that, that they think they did to get through it, but they really don't know the underlying skills of it.

They know that, well, maybe I, I shoot a hinge release or I do this or I do that. You know, but they don't tell you. I remember being in that international match this one time and I was down and I just shot a nine and I needed a 10 to win.

I remember saying this, but because we don't see that as the actual skill, their advice goes right over the head of whatever. The Archers are very high level. Archers don't usually have coaches because especially in the Compound world, the coaches have nothing for them, and that seems to be in these lower levels as well.

I don't necessarily want to, you know, talk down on people, but there's this mid-level coaching racket. I see it as a racket. Their Archer will be having trouble, a mental problem on the line or whatever. Maybe the Archer's crying or just totally frustrated, can't even get their pin on the target or punch the trigger or whatever.

The coach starts talking about, you know, how they have to hold their shoulders a certain way or something, because it always goes back to form. Because that's all we've ever had. Well, that's not the case anymore. Now we have the information, we know how the brain works.

I'm hoping that these mid-level coaches actually get the information so that they can actually help their archers through these high stress events. Because, again, we're asking these young people to do something that's just shy of impossible. But Archery is literally the highest of high in human concentration.

So more kids need to be shooting because we don't just go shoot our bows. We use our bows to practice the ultimate skill of the human being. What is the one skill, the one life skill that has gotten you through everything in your life so far?

Let me give you some common ones. Some common answers when I ask people what's the one life skill that's gotten you through everything, they tell me mental toughness. They tell me determination, persistence, consistency, ability to take pain, honesty, calmness, all these things, right?

And I ask them, how do you do that? How do you teach that? How do you teach determination? I used to say, I cannot teach you determination. It's only something that I can help you find. That's no longer the case. Now I can actually teach you determination because I know what the ultimate skill is.

So when I ask them, how do you teach this? Nobody's got an answer for it. Because if we're going to use that as our answer, determination is not a skill. It is the result of a skill. When I said we don't go shoot our bows, we use our bows to practice the ultimate skill. What we now know is the ultimate skill of the human being is the ability to get loud in your head with the right words at the right moments.

That's how we literally do everything. That's how you become determined. That's how you have mental toughness, that's how you have consistency, that's all these things, the discipline that's all rooted in getting loud in your head with the right words, at the right moments.

So parents, even if your child is not that good at Archery, please keep them in Archery because you are teaching a skill that is the ultimate skill of the human being. We're not going and shooting our bows. We're using our bows to practice getting loud in our heads with the right word, at the right moment.

These are extreme stress events for the human mind. We might just see it as an Archery tournament, but it to the mind, it's an extreme stress event because you're trying to do these minute movements and override your central nervous system so that you can do these movements.

That doesn't happen any other way other than speech. Speech is how you override your central nervous system. That's why I'm not an Archery coach. I'm a speech coach.

Manisha: Right. That makes sense. How do you deal with an Archer whose goals outweigh their work ethic?

Joel: So their goals outweigh their work ethic. Like, I want to shoot a 900 at Vegas, but they don't go shoot very much. Or when they do shoot, they're punching a trigger or they can't get their pin on the target.

Maybe I'm too blunt with this. I lay it out for them. I'm like, you're never going to get it if you keep doing these things. And that's the reality that they're going to have to come to. Like when people watch Bodie is like, well, how does he do it? Well, Bodie follows a very specific system. Does Bodie have to practice that much? No, because Bodie has built a toolbox. Bodie knows exactly what he needs to say to himself.

If he gets in a bad situation, in a shoot-off, where maybe the shot's not going off how he wants to go off, you don't have time to let down. But Bodie's practiced the fight. Instead of just letting a bow down, he's practiced the fight. He knows exactly where that arrow's going to hit when he puts extra tension into the system.

Maybe I'm too blunt with it, but I have to, you have to give these young people the reality of the situation. Like you're not going to get it shooting the way you shoot punch in a trigger, or if you're locked off target. It's one of the most common problems.

The school programs that we have in place, the National Archery in the Schools Program, do you have that in Canada?

Manisha: We do, yes.

Joel: So that is the birth of target panic. That program is the birth of target panic because it allows young people to follow the path of their own mind. They don't teach a conscious override. They teach you to draw the bow back, aim it at the target, and release the string as we've all been taught.

If you look down the line in a NASP tournament, there's less than 5% of the kids that are actually aiming at the spot. They're all locked off the target. And then you'll see the bow yip up or yip down when they release the string.

There's science behind it. So if the NASP program would teach something other than form and start teaching some of this mental control, these young people wouldn't be so frustrated and then they would understand what it really takes to shoot at these very high levels.

I mean, the information is out there. There's online courses. There's our online courses. Bodie's got his own online course. Now the information is out there on how to get to these very high levels. It was never there before. And in many of these programs, like you're not allowed to go outside of this very set curriculum, but the curriculum is the pathway to frustration.

And that's one of the frustrating things for me to watch these young people, they're having fun. Yes. But it's a lot more fun if you actually hit the middle.

Manisha: So true. True.

Joel: Yeah.

Manisha: If Bodie decided to pick up a baseball bat instead of a bow.

Joel: Mm-hmm.

Manisha: Would the skills that he has acquired go from one field to

another?

Joel: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. When you understand that the skill is getting loud in your head with the right words at the right moment, that skill is literally how we do everything. Until you got out of bed today, you didn't get out of bed today until you got loud enough in your head with the right words at the right moment. Right? So it's literally transcends all facets of life.

So if Bodie wanted to play baseball, he would just understand that when he is hitting, he would have to put his conscious mind into the ball right at the release point of the pitcher, and keep his conscious mind in the ball, in vision, if you will, and allow his bat to swing in an automatic mode of program.

I now train Major League baseball teams. It's, it's no different. It's just understanding where to put your conscious mind when to put it there and how to put it there. It's what we call now the Mental Game Equation.

Manisha: Why is it detrimental for a parent five minutes before the whistle blows and their Archer approaches the line, why is it so detrimental for a parent to say, "just relax, it'll be fine".

Joel: Well, relaxation is not part of the equation. Because the bodies of the Archers are physiologically changed. When they step on the line, they get massive doses of cortisol, stress, hormone, and adrenaline, both, which causes the body to change.

And the tension, it hits every Archer in different places. It might be in the bow hand, it might be in the release hand, it might be in your legs. It might be in the bow arm. That's what they have. That's why they have to shoot tournaments so they understand where the adrenaline, where the extra tension hits them. And then you can alter your your mental program when these nerves hit you.

That's what Bodie is a master at. Bodie is a master of awareness and knowing exactly how he's feeling that day, how fast he needs to work, the trigger on his release, never going past the speed limit of Open Loop, and, we'll, we can talk about that if you want, but Open Loop is a movement that's too fast for you to stop or modify that that is punching the trigger. 

Closed Loop is slow enough you could stop it anywhere within it. To do Closed Loop, especially for a movement that causes an explosion, that requires speech, you've got to talk yourself through it because that's the override of the central nervous system. The central nervous system wants you to punch the trigger so that it can brace your Archer for the impact.

That's where you see collapses. That's where you see them grabbing the bow hand, all these things. When the nerves hit your Archer, your Archer has to know how to deal with that. And have they ever practiced with the symptoms of that? They wouldn't know what the symptoms are until they shoot a tournament.

Like for me, personally, it used to be that my legs shook, my legs, felt like rubber. When I would shoot Vegas first scoring in my legs would feel like rubber. And I felt like I was almost out of balance. And I've shot so many tournaments now that I understand. That adrenaline used to hit me in my legs. Then when it stopped doing that, it would hit me in my bow arm.

My bow arm would shake. So to counteract that or to deal with those things, what I started doing was shooting some of the arrows in my practice end on one foot, and people think I'm crazy standing up there.

"Why are you shooting on one foot, Turner?"

I'm like, because I am practicing the ultimate skill of the human being. I'm practicing getting loud in my head with the right words at the right moment so that I can work through my trigger. Right? When you stand on one foot, you have the distraction of balance. It is in the priorities of your body and mind balance is almost number one.

So I've got the distraction of balance, and now I'm seeing this huge sight picture doesn't matter. No matter what I'm seeing, no matter what I'm feeling it, I'm not going to fall over. I'll put my foot down if I need to, but I instantly pick it back up. And I still work through my trigger, not caring where my arrow goes in my practice ends because I am practicing letting go of the aim.

The skill is not in the aim itself. The skill is in how well can you step away from it. So I'm giving myself reps in dealing with the symptoms that I'm about to experience. As soon as they say it's my first scoring end, like my mind knows that I'm going to work through my trigger no matter what anyways, so it stops putting the problem in.

So now I don't get those feelings when I'm on the line. My legs aren't shaking anymore. My arm doesn't shake anymore. I still shake. If you watch my arrows, you'll see my arrows in my quiver. They're shaking, but I'm not seeing that in my sight picture. It doesn't matter for my accuracy how much I shake. Those skills were gained through experience.

Your Archer has to get on that line and shoot and fail, so that they understand where the symptoms hit them. Like, Bodie's first couple ends at Vegas or Lancaster or whatever, he shakes more. I mean, his pin is going from edge of the nine to edge of the nine, but we don't care because we know that his pin movement, we've tuned his bow and we've weighted his bow a specific way so that his pin movement back to the centre is so fast he can't comprehend it.

He realizes that he's shaking, but it doesn't matter. His job is to work the trigger, not to fix the aim. And just an awareness of that is, is huge.

Manisha: Can an Archer learn to deal with the pressure of spectators? Usually there's no one around, maybe a few people on the line, they get to a tournament like Lancaster, like Vegas, and all of a sudden you've got hundreds, potentially thousands of people walking around watching, talking. It's loud. The music. How does someone get ready for that, especially a new Archer, new to this circuit?

Joel: So this concept is one that I wish every young person knew. It's the concept of thoughts aren't thinking thoughts are what you hear. Thinking is what you say. When I do a keynote, it's called the "Four Pillars of How". The first “Pillar of How”, basically, how we do everything, is “Thoughts aren't Thinking”.

Thoughts are what you hear. Thinking is what you say. Thoughts have no instruction. Thoughts have no strategy. Thoughts cannot solve a problem. Thinking is your voice and it's got to be the loudest one in the room. So the difference between shooting in the backyard with nobody around and shooting in front of hundreds or thousands of spectators, the only difference in those two things, the task of shooting the bow is no different. But the thought volume is extremely different, right?

So when you're in your backyard, your thought volume is very low and you're able to easily talk yourself through your shot if you even do talk yourself through your shot. If you don't, then you are shooting in the backyard with a low thought volume and no thinking volume.

And then when you get into a spectator situation, your thought volume of, oh my gosh, I hope I don't miss. I'm going to be embarrassed. All these things, if you say I'm going to be embarrassed, that has no instruction. It has no strategy. It is a thought. One other thing that we have to know is you cannot control your thoughts.

"I hope I don't embarrass myself" is coming whether you like it or not, but it's what you do after, you know, your thought volume is increased. You can't control the volume of thoughts, but you can always control the volume of your thinking, which again is your voice, and it's got to be the loudest one in the room.

We spoke earlier about the ultimate skill of the human being, the ability to get loud in your head with the right words at the right moment. The first “Pillar of How” is "thoughts aren't thinking".

The second Pillar is "the ability to get loud in your head with the right words at the right moment". It's the "ultimate skill of the human being".

The third “Pillar of How” is "Open and Closed Loop Control Systems", this is how your mind governs movements. And the fourth one is the Mental Game Equation that we talked about earlier. If your Archer has not practiced speaking during their shot. They don't know what their conversation sounds like. 

If you know what your conversation sounds like and you have blueprinted it, meaning like this, if I was going to shoot a for practice, this is what would be a Commentary Shot. "Okay. I am drawn back and aiming pins in the middle. Got it. Okay. Now I'm putting my thumb on the button. Just a little bit of pressure. Not too much. Okay, got it. Here I go. Easy now. A little bit. That's it. Stay in that squeeze. Until the shot goes off or it doesn't, it's none of your business. Right?

When you can speak fluently, when your conversation is easy, then and only then do you truly understand what you say and when you say it. So that's what I want Archers to do. When you are practicing, you do commentary shooting where you're actually speaking out loud. And you find that people have a really hard time speaking out loud when they shoot because people have a really hard time speaking out loud in public.

It's the biggest human fear there is public humiliation, right? Well, that's what we're doing as Archers stand in front of thousands of people. So learning how to speak during your shot is the ultimate tool because then when the thought volume gets loud. You know how to adjust the volume of your thinking. You know how to get loud.

Manisha: So you mentioned watching Bodie and quite often I will watch Reece. And, the longer you watch your Archer, you can see those very subtle changes. You can see those little differences, a little head movement, something that is expressing what's going on in their brain, and immediately that emotion that they have felt after they've released the arrow.

If a parent is watching their Archer and they notice that something is off. Say they've lost focus. If an Archer does come back to them and just stand with them in between and say, especially if there's like an A/B, C/D line, what is it that an a parent could say to help connect and get their Archer back to where you're saying about the speaking to themselves.

Joel: When I walked into the Philadelphia Phillies pitching team, and nobody knew me from anybody, I walked in there and they introduced me as this shooting coach. And I've got this son that's an amazing Archer and all this stuff. And the pitchers were like, yeah, what? What's that do for us? Right? And I, I said, who are my coaches?

And there was, you know, 10 dudes that raised their hand, and they've obviously been in the MLB for, you know, their entire lives or whatever.

And I said, what does a mound visit sound like for you? And the mound visit where the coach goes out to the mound and has to talk to the pitcher that just hit somebody or just threw too many balls or whatever it is, right?

I said, what's a mound visit sound like? And nobody said anything. And I said, well, we're just going to sit here in silence until somebody pipes up, you know? So finally one of the coaches says, well, I like to go out there and ask them how they're feeling. I said, oh, what do they tell you? He said, well, sometimes they say they're feeling good, and sometimes they say they're feeling bad.

I said, that is a worthless conversation.

And it's a worthless conversation because the coaches don't know how the pitchers do what they do. And then I looked at the pitchers. I said, can one of you explain how you do what you do? Nobody had an answer. Major league pitchers the best of the best. These were all the top roster fellows too, and not one of them could explain how they do what they do, because they could not explain what they say.

And the coaches didn't know that that's the question to ask.

So for your question, the parents, if you need to refocus your child into their Archery shot, your only question is "what did you say"? "What were you saying during your shot?"

And if they don't have an answer, they weren't talking. And if they're not talking, they're not thinking. If they're not thinking, they're not doing the conscious override of the central nervous system. If they're not talking, then they're shooting on thoughts alone.

They're looking at the next person's target going, "oh man, they just shot a 10". That has no instruction, that has no strategy. That is a thought. Cannot help you. Cannot solve your problem. As the parent, all you need to know is what your child says.

This is for a Recurve Barebow shot. I draw back and aim, then I tension up. Then I say, here I go to prep my mind. Then I talk about holding, like I'm talking to a loved one that's hanging off a cliff, and I don't want them to let go, yet.

It gives my mind a little bit of time to settle. If you're shooting a release aid, draw back an aim, then address the trigger. And that's a key point.

Because most people that are locked off the target or punch the trigger, they put their finger on the trigger before they aim, and then their goal is to shoot the release aid as soon as the aim looks right.

So the aim becomes the stimulus for the shot. The aim then becomes connected to the explosion of the bow. The aim is then locked off target. That is the sequence that happens. Your subconscious mind will not allow you to get your pin to the middle because being in the middle equals the explosion.

Key point: Number One, drawback an aim.

Number Two, address the trigger.

Number Three. Here I go. Say something that you would say to jump off

a cliff into water. How would you get yourself to cause your body to do

a movement that causes your body impact? Many people say, here I

go. Let's do this, whatever it is for you, right?

So, job number one, drawback and aim.

Job Number Two, address the trigger.

Job Number Three. Here I go.

Job Number Four is to talk through the pressure increase on the trigger.

And you need to know what your Archer sounds like. That's why you have them shoot while talking out loud, just for a few shots until you both figure out what does your blueprint sound like for your shot.

And then when you see your Archer out there on the line and they have lost focus, it is because they have stopped talking. That's always the base problem. They have stopped talking. That means the thought volume is louder than the thinking volume, and we can't allow the subconscious to have the trigger. That's what was taught for decades.

Manisha: Let's talk a little bit more about blueprints. How does a blueprint change from bow style, experience of an Archer, and their release? So you as a Barebow Archer compared to, say, Bodie as a Compound Archer, or Reece as a Recurve Archer?

Joel: So Compound, it's virtually the same for whatever release aid: draw back and aim, then you address the trigger.

If your trigger has a click in it, like if you're shooting hinge or an OnneX clicker or whatever, that's where you go to the click. After you have aimed, you address the trigger. After you have aimed. Then prep your mind with, here I go, or whatever you say. Then you have to have a conversation and your conversation through the trigger press or moving the hinge or resistance release or whatever it may be.

Whatever the movement is. It starts with what we call "little speech". "Little Speech" is how would you actually teach a child to thread a needle, right? Or do some precise movement, right? If you've got the needle and you're trying to just get that thread in there, you're not like, go. Eh, come on. You got this. Right? It's, it's easy now. A little bit. There you go. That's it. Yeah. All right. Stay in that. Stay in that. There you go. Okay. Squeeze; or whatever it may be. So your trigger pressure increase is started with "little speech". because that's how you teach, right?

So you start with a "little speech" and that's you pressing on the gas pedal just a little bit, watching the speedometer come up. And then when you get to the right pressure increase or the right speed limit, you hit the cruise control button.

Once you get to that right pressure increase, you just stay in that pressure increase until it goes off or it doesn't. It's none of your business. That's a compound with a release aid.

Okay, Barebow Archers. It depends on whether you're shooting a mechanicalreceptive trigger or not. So me as a Barebow Archer, I shoot what's called a tab sear. It's not a device, it's just the edge of the tab. So I draw back and then I tension up, I get tension properly, and then I put my thumbnail on the edge of the tab.

This is all legal and World Archery and everything. It's all been written about and it's all good. You put your thumbnail on the edge of the tab, and then you simply increase pressure on that. Slow enough. You could stop it just like you're working a trigger on a release aid. You're increasing pressure.

When that pops off the back of the tab, it pops off as a surprise. When that happens, the mechanoreceptors that are in your skin cells, they send the signal to your brain. Your brain sends the release motor program. Okay, so that's my job in my Barebow shot. So I draw back an aim, then I tension up. Then I address the sear with my thumb.

Then I'm talking myself through a pressure increase on the trigger, and when that thing pops, the mechanoreceptors send the signal in my brain. My brain sends the release motor program.

Similar to how Reece shoots with Olympic Recurve shooting with a clicker. A clicker's, just another form of a mechanoreceptive trigger. So it draws back in, aims then gets tension, right? Transfer to hold, a lot of people call it. Transfer to hold. Then here I go, and then talking through expansion that gets the arrow through the clicker.

A Barebow shot, with no mechanoreceptive trigger, that's where we incorporate what we call the "safety concept".

The "safety concept" is a movement that requires conscious attention. It doesn't happen by accident. It is a movement that you have to physically come out of your shot and do. For most people, I will tell them to use a finger that's on the front of their bow. So like, let's say that your, your normal grip is just one finger on the front of the bow. I have them put another one on there as the safety.

So they draw their bow back and then they tension up, and then they take the safety off. So just take the finger off the front of the bow and tuck it away. Then they talk about holding and what that does, that physical movement of taking the safety off separates the aim and the tension from the explosion of the bow because you've got something that you have to do in the middle of it, and it separates the mind from the aim.

And we're not using the aim as the stimulus. So after the safety's off, you're very conscious about what's going on, and that's where you talk about holding and you train longer and longer holds after the safety's off. Okay?

So that's how we use a Barebow shot to practice getting loud in our head with the right words at the right moment. 

So most of the compound shots, there's those four elements, drawback and aim, then you address the trigger. Then here I go. Then you talk about the pressure increase.

Manisha: What is decision power?

Joel: That's the background of the decision. That's the decision that you have made that is getting loud in your head with the right words at the right moment, right?

Manisha: Mm-hmm.

Joel: These decisions are not just conjured up. It is you speaking. If you don't decide to shoot the shot with control no matter what, then you've already handed the shot to the subconscious, and the subconscious is phenomenal at aiming. It's phenomenal at breathing and balance and all those things. It's even better at punching a trigger. That's what it's built for.

The subconscious is there to keep you safe. Your central nervous system is there to keep you safe. So if you allow the subconscious to have the trigger, it will always brace you for impact. It'll always be linked to the trigger motor program. Pre-ignition movement.

Manisha: Have you learned anything from Bodie since he has gone on this SHOTIQ journey of his own?

Have you learned anything or picked up any insights different to what you have shared with him?

Joel: The differences are not mental, they are technical. So Bodie is a technical master of his bow and his peep sight. The pin is not in the middle of his peep sight, it's at the bottom. The pin, the dot that he uses for indoor is at the bottom of his peep sight.

Why is that? Well, the most common problem for people that miss is because they fall out of their peep sight when they fall out of their peep sight, when their head falls out of it. The pin that was in the middle is now not in the middle, but it's not able to be picked up by the mind. It doesn't see that in the middle of the shot.

If Bodie falls out of his peep sight, his dot literally goes away. You can't see it anymore. So he knows that he's fallen out of the peep sight. So that's a technical thing that I didn't even know he was doing. So these are just little things that, that he's picked up and he is a master of bow stabilization. He knows that if his sight is ticking left, that he moves his bar in the back bar in just a quarter of an inch or, or up or down, or whichever way that the sight pin and the sight pin speed tells him everything. But as far as mental goes, he hasn't necessarily taught me anything in that realm other than what we're doing is scientifically correct. It's just literally how it works.

It's been quite an interesting ride to see, to see that. I don't know that we'll get into this, but I told the story of Bodie punching his trigger at three years old. I did not want him to go down the same path that I had gone down in my life of target panic. I mean, oh my goodness. It was a frustrating young life.

When Bodie punched that trigger for the first time, I said, we're not doing that, and this is one of the most key things that I want to get through to Archery parents. When I saw Bodie do that with an index finger trigger, I instantly had him shoot a resistance activated release.

A resistance activated release, if folks don't know it has a safety on it. It fires off of a specific poundage, so there's no trigger on this release. It has a safety on it. So the Archer would push the safety in, hooks it onto the D loop, draws the bow back with the safety, depressed, pushed in, draws the bow back, aims the bow, and then takes the safety off.

And then they simply increase pressure. They don't have any triggers to work with. They just increase pressure. They just expand and it goes off at, you know, hopefully three or four pounds over the holding weight of their bow.

Using a resistance activated release is the best thing that has happened to Archery ever, literally, ever. Because now we can take young people that have a difficult time overriding their own central nervous system, which is most young people. You can separate the aim from the explosion of the bow by a simple safety and there's no trigger. So they're using big movements. Big, easy to control movements and all you need them to do is get them to pull in a Closed Loop control system, which means slow enough, they can stop it, but fast enough they can feel it.

If you punch a resistance active release, you're not going to hit much. So there's a consequence to it and it seems to take the young mind and just bring it in. And these kids get instant shot control and they're learning proper Archery movements and the frustration leaves them. It is a beautiful thing.

So parents, if you can afford it, it is the number one piece of Archery equipment, if your son or daughter shoots a compound with a release aid.

Manisha: What would you say to a parent who says, you know what, my Archer is way too young for mental performance. They're not at that stage yet. What would you say to them?

Joel: I would say they're never too young to learn how to think. The whole thoughts aren't thinking thing.

My buddy of mine, his kid was scared of the monster in the hallway. The young child would not go to the restroom at night because of the monster in the hallway. So he would always go into his parents' room. Dad would have to get up and escort his son to the restroom because of the monster in the hallway.

My buddy knows SHOTIQ inside and out and used the thoughts aren't thinking, and the ultimate skilled human being. He wasn't even really able to convince his son that there was not a monster in the hallway, but he also taught his son how to talk his way through things.

And so a few nights later you could hear the pitter-patter of feet down the hallway and the son was very proud that he had done that. And he told his dad exactly how he did it by, by telling his dad what he said, not what he did. The skill was not in you walking down the hallway, the skill is in what you said so that you could start walking down the hallway.

You see what I mean? So this thoughts aren't thinking is a, it's an incredible concept. As soon as a child can speak, they can start practicing the ultimate skill of the human being.

Manisha: When an Archer turns around and looks at the face of their parent, what would you hope that a parent is not projecting?

Joel: Well, the parent obviously doesn't want to be angry at them. If there's any signal that you have worked out with your child, that would mean it's got to get loud, right? Or start talking. That's what happened. They stopped talking again. When they stopped talking, they stopped thinking. And then the pre-ignition movements that are linked to the trigger motor program become a thousand fold. Right?

So maybe that arrow that that left was because of a collapse. It's usually because of a collapse. That's exactly what the subconscious is trying to get you to do every single shot. It's just that one time you didn't get loud enough and you became the victim of your own mind.

You know how to fix it. If you didn't have the blueprint to fall back on, there's no way to fix it. That's why I'm hoping that folks get this blueprint with their children. Understand how they do what they do.

What kind of look would you give them? Carry on. But got to get loud. So if they had some type of hand signal or whatever, but I see lots of kids turn around and look at their parents on every single shot, and that is a child that doesn't know how they do what they do.

Manisha: What would you say would be the most productive way to conduct yourself as a parent on the car ride home?

Joel: I'm usually talking about my shooting. Not so much Bodie shooting, but we don't need to talk about that. There's other things to talk about. But what I find is that when people are in control of an Archery shot, that's what they want to talk about because they're proud of how they perform instead of being totally frustrated.

The frustration in Archery does not need to exist any longer, but the programs that have been out there and the coaching that's been out there and the concepts that have been out there for the last few decades are opposite of the science of how the brain works, and they have pushed people into frustration.

There are a few heroes in Archery. Especially for young people. Now, Bodie is one of them, and that's awesome. I hope that young kids watch how Bodie shoots a bow and they aspire to that, but they've got to understand how Bodie does it. And he does it through speech. He does it by talking.

And there are other heroes that shoot in different ways. We call them command shooters, right? It's a different way of doing business and it is not a bad way of doing business. There are some phenomenal shooters, but there's a couple that are at the tippy top that win fairly consistently. It's usually them or Bodie. 

But there's this big rivalry in Archery right now, and I know that the kids see it because the kids will tell me about it. I want to be like so-and-so, so I'm going to command shoot. I want to be like Bodie, so I'm going to shoot surprise break. Cool, really cool.

But you have to understand that a command shooter is a constantly frustrated person. They are trying to work the trigger when the pin is in the middle, so they have to super weight their bows. And I see kids doing this. They put a bunch of weight on their bows to slow their pin down so that they can catch it when it's in the middle.

And the problem is, is that they start working the trigger before it gets to the middle. That's the typical way that target panic works. That's how your subconscious works, because a command shot works with your subconscious.

You're doing conscious aiming and subconscious shot activation, and that can be the road to disaster. I see kids aspiring to be like these folks and really good command shooters are somewhat of an anomaly. They're usually very calm people. And they are not going to work that trigger until that pin is in the middle and it's parked in the middle.

That's more difficult than most people realize. If your child chooses to shoot that way, like if they have the ability to shoot a surprise break on the trigger or command shoot, they'll go, well, I'm more accurate when I'm a command shooter.

If they're in this for the long haul, then they may find it more accurate sometimes. But overall, a surprise break will be more accurate because if you shoot the release aid as a surprise break, meaning a Closed Loop control system, meaning slow enough, you could stop it. The shot is a surprise.

Your body doesn't know when to brace, so there won't be any pre-ignition movements linked to the trigger motor program. I know I'm getting scientific with it, but this is the science behind it. There's no flinch essentially because your body doesn't know when to flinch. If you're a command shooter, you are dealing with flinch.

Every single time, because you go open loop on the trigger meaning so fast, you can't control it right so fast. You can't gain feedback in it. That allows the body to brace you for impact, which we see as a flinch. That's what leads to almost all of the misses in Archery is the pre-ignition movements. The ones that get linked to, it's not just that they're doing this, it's that they're doing this, right. They're grabbing their bow when they punch the trigger, or they're doing a micro collapse that they can't even feel when they punch the trigger.

Or they can't get their pin on the target and they yip the bow up and punch the trigger at the same time. These are all the things that I see on a daily basis, especially with young people. So be careful of who your heroes are. Understand how they do what they do. because there's science behind it all.

Manisha: I have one question that was sent into me, and it's from an Archery parent, and this question is for you, for their scenario:

This Archery parent has a son who is 13, shoots a Compound and says that he is an absolute beast at home shooting arrows constantly and doing well. But Mike says as soon as they pull into the parking lot of a tournament, his son turns into a different person.

Joel: Mm-hmm.

Manisha: He gets quiet, he starts punching his release, he won't look his dad in the eye.

Joel: Mm-hmm.

Manisha: And Mike wants to know: is he putting too much pressure on his Archer, or does his Archer need a better blueprint?

Joel: So the difference between practice scores and tournament scores, like Bodie used to vomit every time before a tournament. I mean, it was bad. He would get nauseous and since he was a little kid, he would do that and it would start the moment we woke up the day of the tournament, he wouldn't eat.

And it was, you know, Bodie shoots very high level. But even though he did all those things and his body is very physiologically changed, he knew exactly how he was going to shoot. He knew he was going to draw back an name, then he knew he was going to address the trigger.

Then he knew he was going to say, here I go. Then he knew he was going to talk himself through the pressure increase on the trigger. Archers that have significant differences when their body is physiologically changed from backyard shooting to tournament shooting, they just don't know how they do it. So therefore, because they don't know how they do it, they have no confidence.

We define confidence as understanding how you do what you do. There can be no mystery in your shot. You know you're going to draw back an aim. You know you're not even going to put your finger on the trigger until the aim is complete, as shaky as it may be, you have to understand that no matter which way it moves, this next movement is always back to the centre.

So no matter how much you're shaking, that's not your job. Just put the pin in the middle and enjoy the show, right? It's just dance and all. Just enjoy the show. Then, you know, you're going to say, here I go. Or, whatever you need to say to jump off a cliff into water. Then you know you're going to talk yourself through a pressure increase, and your conversation might be different than it is in the backyard. It certainly needs to be louder.

This is the plight of most Archers. What you described, that question that came in from that Archery parent, is most Archers because the cortisol level changes significantly. The adrenaline level changes significantly. It does crazy things. You're prepping your body for, we don't really see it as this, but it's for the mind. It's one of the highest stress events there is. You're doing a minute movement that causes an explosion, and you're supposed to ignore that. We're not biologically wired that way.

If we do have to shoot something, we're wired to brace for impact. Right? And that's, that's what causes most misses. If your Archer doesn't know how they do what they do, that's going to happen to them. But if you know what you're going to say, it's so powerful to know that.

To walk into those situations knowing that you have a blueprint and the person next to you is going through what you used to. You're instantly way at a way higher level than the person next to you. It's a battle of who gets the loudest. That's the battle. It's not who shoots the best, because the person that shoots the best is going to be the loudest in their head because that's the skill.

Manisha: What is the difference between MindIQ and SHOTIQ?

Joel: SHOTIQ is for shooting. It's shooting based. MINDIQ is for everything else. It's how to get out of bed in the morning. It's how to actually learn what it sounds like to get loud in your head. Because that was a question by one of the Philadelphia Phillies pitchers. How do you get loud in your head? What do you mean get loud in my head? Some people have a difficult time getting loud in their head.

One drill that I'll give you and give to these parents from MINDIQ is what we call the "Empty Lung Hold". So you get your stopwatch out on your phone, you take a deep breath in, you let it all the way out, and then when you're holding your breath, you hit your stopwatch and you see how long you can go and you hold your breath for as long as you can. 

And then when you have to take another breath, you hit the stop and you see how much time you have. Let's say you got 15 seconds. 15 seconds, okay, we got to do it again. And you got to get at least 10 more. You got to get at least 10 more seconds. There's no other way to do that other than to get loud in your head because the first time you held your breath, as soon as the thoughts of, oh my gosh, I'm going to suffocate here, right?

As soon as your thoughts got louder than your thinking, you took another breath. So the only way to override that central nervous system that's screaming at you is to get louder. Stay in it. Stay in it. I can go more. I got another 10 seconds, right? Getting loud in your head with the right words at the right moment, you have to get 10 more seconds, and then when you do get that 10 more seconds, you realize exactly how you did it.

That is what it feels like to get loud in your head with the right words at the right moment. You speak out loud during your shot until your conversation becomes easy, then you truly understand how you did it. Then you can blueprint what you said because when people video their kid's shooting, they try to dissect all these things, right? But you have no idea what was in the conscious mind of your Archer. 

You can video what they did, but you can't video what they said because they're not talking. But when you video your Commentary Shot of your young Archer, then you can truly blueprint how they did it.

Manisha: How do you counter athletes, not just Archers, who say that they clear their mind.

Joel: Mm-hmm.

Manisha: Rather than just talking it through.

Joel: I ask them, how do you clear your mind? People tell me that all the time. I shoot quiet minded. Cool. How do you become quiet minded? And they have no idea. They have no idea how they get in that state, but how they get in that state is by talking louder than the thoughts that are coming. That's how you clear it out. And it's still, it's never clear. It's just you're quiet.

So most of those Archers, if they shoot with a blank mind, if you will, they are going Open Loop on the trigger. They may be successful in that. They may be experiencing most of the problems that that people deal with when they shoot Open Loop on the trigger. Bodie does not talk his way through a shot any longer, only because his controlled shot has become a fundamental truth. It is how he's going to do it no matter what. I'd never worry about Bodie punching a trigger. I'm not even sure that he would ever do that other than if it was required for a certain fast moving target or something, and you don't have to practice that.

Your body will do that if you command it to do that. When Bodie is in a high stress tournament or high stress shoot-off and the shot's not going as it should. Again, he has practiced the fight. He has the toolbox and his toolbox is full of words. Those are his tools.

So I'll give you an example. He was in a shoot off at Lancaster. He had this one shot that was going well till it wasn't, and there's only 20 seconds per shot, so you don't have time to let down. You can't reset the system. So he drew back his bow. Aim looked good. He only had to shoot an 11. He didn't need to shoot a 12, just an 11 on this one. So he drew back his bow. That was good. Then he pressed his OnneX clicker to the click. That was good. And then he noticed that his release hand was shaking. Oh, my gosh, my release hand is shaking. That is a thought. It has no instruction. It has no strategy. It is a thought. It cannot solve the problem. So what did Bodie do? Because he couldn't control that thought, right?

You can't control the thought of, oh my gosh, my hand is shaking. But you can always adjust the volume of your thinking. So for him, drew back a name. Good. Click. Good. Oh my gosh, my hand is shaking. No, no, no, no. Come on. Now. Squeeze, boom till the shot went off because the shot was getting very stale.

And I'm in the coach's box, I'm like, “Come on, boy, Use your words.” Right. That's what I'm saying. Just like we're talking to a little kid. Use your words, you know, so there I am going, come on, use your words. And he is in his head, just squeeze, boom. The shot breaks. It was a stale shot, but he knew that he was still within a window, that he is going to be able to hit the 11 ring. And he did. He dead centred it. But you'll get to the point, and that's where I want people to get to, to the point where I'm at that point as well.

I don't need to talk myself through a shot unless it's extreme stress. Shoot-off, bow hunting, whatever it may be, right? That's when I get loud. But only that can only happen after you've formulated the conversation out loud.

Then when you know what you're going to say, then, and only then can you take it internal. And then once it's internal and you've done it so many times, that it becomes the way you do it no matter what. Like, no question. No mystery. This is how you do it. Then you just, you can put the toolbox underneath the shelf, got to remember when to pull it out though, right?

And you got to remember the tools that are in it.

Manisha: As someone is assembling their toolbox as they're learning the system, learning what works for them, are there certain words that they think are going to be advantageous and work for them, but they're actually not?

Joel: How you speak is how you move. So if your speech is not smooth and rhythmic, your movement will not be smooth and rhythmic. Like if it's really choppy, if they draw back an aim, got it. They press to the click or whatever they do to address the trigger, then here I go. And then it's press, press, press, press, or whatever it is. If it's choppy, if it's got spaces in it between, press, press, that gap will be filled with thoughts.

You cannot leave gaps in your speech. Like when you heard me do a Commentary Shot. There's very few gaps and there are no gaps when I get to squeeze. That's why you take one word and stretch it. It can be whatever you want it to be. It seems to help in high stress if you actually talk about the motor program, like squeeze or Go or whatever it may be.

If the connection's already been built, seems to be a little stronger in high stress events, but it can literally be anything you want it to be. As long as it is rhythmic and unending, no gaps because the gaps will be filled with press. Well, it looks good. Press, oh my gosh, I might miss press, right? And you'll see they'll go open loop on the trigger between the words.

But if you have the words and you just stretch them out, if that's what you want to do with your trigger, if you stretch that word out, that is key. You've got to be fluent in this speech, in this language. It's almost like a language, and it's the language of teaching. How would you teach somebody else that's experiencing the exact same problem and you see them finally start into the movement how you want them to. Easy out.Yeah. That's it. Yep. Stay in that. Okay, good squeeze. You got remember that your initial pressure increase on the trigger is not to make it go off, it's just to set the speed limit. The speed limit is set by "little speech".

Manisha: What is Bodie's program? You referred to it a little bit earlier.

Joel: So Bodie has "Bodie Turner's Indoor Archery Secrets". That's his new online course. And what happens in that course is I interview Bodie during a Vegas 300 Round. So he's shooting a 300 Round, and he'll shoot a shot and I'll ask him questions. He shoots another shot, I ask him more questions. It took us an hour and 45 minutes to shoot this 300 Round, and I ask him every question known to mankind about how Bodie Turner does, what Bodie Turner does.

In this 300 Round, even with all the talking, his old man out there just jabbering away, he still shoots a 300 - 29X. And you know, we talk about the one that misses the X as well. So he really spills the beans on how he does it. How he moves his stabilizers based on how his pin movement is for that day. And why he shoots a blade rest. Why he shoots this particular release. How he shoots that release differently in the first two ends as opposed to the middle ends, and how he differs on the last two ends.

It's amazing to hear him talk about how he does it because it is literally the secrets. That maybe other people don't know, or if they do know them, they're not putting them out there. We want people to succeed. We're not holding back the secrets of how we do it because we know that Archery has impacted us so heavily in such a positive way. Why would you hold this back? That's not what we're about. We want people to get out of the life of frustration that I was in all since I was seven till I didn't gain control of my shot, truly until 2014. I was born in 1976, so it was quite a while.

I did not build this system for Archery. I built this system for law enforcement, for firearms, and you know, we do some sniper work in that realm and all the stuff. So that's where I built it. But bow hunting was always my sounding board. And then when Bodie started into real competition Archery, that's when I started into real competition Archery as well.

And that became a sounding board for why did this fail? Or why did I fail in this? And I want to make that clear that nothing I say or any coach says is going to work for you. You have a system that you were born with that keeps you safe from explosions, and we're creating one every single time we shoot a bow.

And it's much more difficult in a bow than it is firearms. Because in firearms, the explosion happens in the apparatus. In Archery, the explosion happens in your body. It's a sudden release of energy. Your mind wants to know when that's going to happen, so it can brace you for impact. And that's what we see as target panic, as missed Xs and all those things.

Manisha: What is the best part about being an Archery Dad?

Joel: The best part is for me, is just watching my son succeed and watching him. And even more than that is the people that come up to me and tell me what a fantastic young man he is. That's better than watching him succeed. And just people telling us that and watching him work with kids is phenomenal.

Bodie does my SHOTIQ seminars with me and watching him work with people. I didn't know this was going to happen when I was seven years old when I picked up that old Bear Recurve, you know? So it's just led to a phenomenal life. I literally live a dream and just watching Bodie in all those environments and all those kids. 

And Bodie likes signing foreheads. So be careful with your kids in the, in the Meet the Pros line. So just be careful with that.

Manisha: So I usually end every episode with two questions about travel. So the first question is, what is your best travel tip for parents?

Joel: Hmm. Wow. My best travel tip. Wow. Mama, what do we got for our best travel tip?

Manisha: Sarah? Yeah, Sarah. Sarah, if you want to add, please do.

Joel: We're trying to think about it, make sure they get out of bed early. And shooting times, if your kid's not a morning person, try to avoid the morning lines. But, uh, as far as traveling goes, we don't do connection flights if possible. I mean, there's, there's tournaments that are starting to be in some crazy places where we can't get connected too, but yeah.

And Air Tags for your bow cases. That's a big one. But connection flights. We fly as close as we can and we rent a car and drive there. So we know that our stuff's going to get there on time. Yeah, that's, that's pretty much it as far as, other than other things, just trying to get your kids out of bed. Yeah. Make sure you drink. Mama says make sure you drink your water on the plane.

Manisha: Yes. And then the second question, it can be either for you or Sarah or Bodie, what do you never leave home without when you're headed to an Archery tournament?

Joel: Probably hydrate, which is, yeah, electrolytes. Make sure that you have electrolytes because you know, if your kid gets nauseous or whatever, you got to keep those, keep those in them. So we don't leave home without those. And uh, yeah, we try to stay hydrated as much as we can.

Manisha: I will close by thanking you for coming onto the podcast. We've been talking about this for about two years. Finally made it happen. I am so happy that we were able to talk to you, not just from a SHOTIQ perspective, but as Bodie's dad, as an Archery parent. If people wanted to get more information about either MINDIQ, about Bodie's program, or the SHOTIQ system, how can they find you?

Joel: It's all at shotiq.com. That's the website that houses all of the online courses. You can email me, JoelTurner@ShotIQ.com. JoelTurnerActual on Instagram. That's the only one. That's me is JoelTurnerActual. There's other things out there that are not me, but JoelTurnerActual is me. So that's how you find us.

Manisha: For all the Archery parents who have experienced things that we've talked about, what Joel has expressed about frustration, about watching your Archer. Just hang in there. We are all trying to do this and we're doing it one arrow at a time. Joel, thanks so much and thank you to Sarah for contributing as well.

Joel: Yeah, I'm Manisha a thumbs up.

Manisha: I'm Manisha. That's Joel, and we will see you again soon.